1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a refrigerator, and more particularly, to a radiating apparatus of a built-in refrigerator that can improve heat radiation in a machine room of the refrigerator installed in a built-in cabinet.
2. Description of the Related Art
A refrigerator is an apparatus to maintain an inner space at a low temperature by repeating a cooling cycle consisting of compression, condensation, expansion and evaporation of a refrigerant, thereby freshly keeping foods cold or frozen for a long time.
Since the refrigerator inevitably has a certain amount of volume, it is protruded out of a wall when installed on a wall of a kitchen or a living room. This is not good for a space saving as well as a beautiful appearance.
To solve the above drawback, there is proposed a built-in refrigerator that is installed in a cabinet as a furniture, looking to be an integral part of the kitchen or the living room.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view illustrating that a refrigerator body 2 is installed in a built-in cabinet 2 like a built-in furniture.
Referring to FIG. 1, the refrigerator body 2 installed in the built-in cabinet 1 is partitioned into a foods storage room and a machine room having a refrigerant circulation unit for maintaining an inside of the foods storage room at a low temperature. Owing to a characteristic of the built-in refrigerator, the refrigerator body 2 has an air flow passage in which air is introduced into the machine room through a lower side of the refrigerator and is discharged along a rear wall of the refrigerator. Thus, a technique for effectively irradiating heat generated in the machine room by smoothly performing heat exchange in the machine room is focused as an important issue.
FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along the line A-A′ of FIG. 1.
Referring to FIG. 2, the built-in refrigerator includes the refrigerator body 2 installed in the built-in cabinet 1, a door panel 3 for opening/closing a cold storage room and a freezer, a base plate 4 for supporting the refrigerator body 2, a wall cover base 5 vertically installed at a lower side of a front side of the refrigerator body 2 and having a vent hole 9, a machine room 6 installed at a rear side of the refrigerator body 2, a suction passage 12 communicating with an exterior through a lower side of the base plate 4 and the vent hole 9 of the wall cover base 5, and an exhaust passage 13 disposed at a rear side of the refrigerator body 2.
In the built-in refrigerator constructed as above, the refrigerator body 2 is inserted into a space provided as a built-in furniture in the built-in cabinet 1 spaced apart by a predetermined interval from a wall surface. The refrigerator body 2 has the door panel 3 at a front side thereof, a drawer cabinet at an upper portion thereof, and the base plate 4 at a lower portion thereof.
The base plate 4 is installed at the lower side of the refrigerator body 2 spaced apart by a predetermined interval from a bottom surface of the refrigerator body 2 to support the refrigerator body 2. The wall cover base 5 is installed at the lower side of the front side of the refrigerator body 2 so as to maker better the appearance of the built-in cabinet 1 and block an introduction of garbage from an exterior.
The machine room 6 is disposed at the rear and lower side of the refrigerator body 2. The machine room 6 includes a compressor 10, a condenser and a blower fan therein, and is protected by a back cover 7. Heat radiation in the machine room 6 is performed by air flowing through the back cover 7.
Also, heat generated in the machine room 6 is effectively irradiated through the heat radiation passages provided at the lower side and the rear side of the built-in cabinet 1. In other words, outer air is suctioned into the machine room 6 through the suction passage 12 formed at the lower side of the refrigerator body 2, and inner air of the machine room 6 is discharged through the exhaust passage 13 formed at the rear side of the refrigerator body 2.
For this purpose, the outer air is introduced through the vent hole 9 of the wall cover base 5 installed at the front and lower side of the built-in cabinet, and the introduced air flows along the suction passage 12 installed between the base plate 4 installed at the lower side of the built-in cabinet 1, and the bottom surface, and along the exhaust passage 13 between the refrigerator body 2 and the wall surface 8. The air flowing along the passages 12 and 13 irradiates heat from the machine room 6 through the back cover 7.
In the built-in refrigerator, a refrigerant sequentially passing through the compressor, the condenser (see 17 of FIG. 3), and a capillary tube is introduced into an evaporator (not shown), and is completely vaporized while passing through the evaporator, thereby depriving a surrounding of heat and cooling the surrounding. Thereafter, the air cooled by the evaporator is supplied to the cold storage room and the freezer, cooling the inside of the refrigerator, and the temperature-elevated cool air is fed back and is introduced into the evaporator.
At this time, when the compressor 10, the condenser and the blower fan of the machine room 6 operate, the air suctioned through the suction passage 12 formed at the lower side of the refrigerator body 2 is inducted toward the inside of the machine room 6, passes through the condenser and the blower fan, and is finally exhausted through the exhaust passage 13 formed at the rear side of the refrigerator body 2.
FIG. 3 is a front view of the machine room of a related art built-in refrigerator.
Referring to FIG. 3, the machine room 6 is provided with the compressor 10 disposed at one side, the blower fan 16 disposed at the other side, and the condenser 17 disposed at a center of the machine room 6. As the blower fan 16 operates, outer air is suctioned through suction holes 14 of the back cover 7, and the air blown by the blower fan 16 sequentially exchanges heat with the condenser 17 and the compressor 10 and is discharged through exhaust holes 15 of the back cover 7.
At this time, the air, which is heat-exchanged in the machine room 6, is exhausted to an outside through the exhaust passage 13, and new air is introduced through the suction passage 12, thereby forming an air circulation.
However, since the related air built-in refrigerator has the structure that heat radiation of the blower fan 16 and the condenser 17 of the machine room 6 is performed by inhaling air through the back cover 7 to exchange heat and again discharging the heat-exchanged air through the back cover 7, there may occur a circulation phenomenon that the air discharged from the machine room 6 is again suctioned into the suction holes 14 or is again introduced via the compressor 10, resulting in the lowering in the heat transfer efficiency.